Dating apps these days are doing much more than just facilitating relationships — between Tinder’s organ donor campaign and Grindr’s plan to live stream Jonathan Anderson’s Sunday show in London’s Fashion Week, these apps are proving that (like their users), there’s much more than meets the eye. The British designer behind the J.W. Anderson line noted a natural alignment between the gay dating app and fashion, telling the New York Times, “I think fashion is a sexy platform as well, ultimately. We’re all humans, so we all have to be somewhat sexually attractive to someone. That’s the name of the game, with clothing.”
While other mobile platforms like Periscope and Snapchat have previously been used to document some of the most sought after runways across the world, Anderson is thinking a bit outside the box with his decision to turn to Grindr. But given that fashion is all about taking risks, it seems appropriate for the British Fashion Awards’ Designer of the Year to push the boundaries not only in his clothes, but in how he introduces and markets them as well.
Broadcasting on Grindr makes clear Anderson’s target audience, and Landis Smithers, the famous creative director turned Grindr’s VP of marketing, told the Times that fashion is “very big topic of interest for a certain segment of our consumer.”
To be fair, the show won’t be streamed directly on the app — when users log in on Sunday, they’ll be given a link and code to use in order to view the show on their smartphones or tablets. Grindr is, however, the only platform to which Anderson has given live streaming access.
While the dating app has never made a foray into the fashion world before, this “no-brainer” of a collaboration may spell the beginning of a long relationship between Grindr and couture. With more than a million active users worldwide every minute, expanding its reach is at the top of the app’s to-do list, and partnering with a house like J.W. Anderson doesn’t seem like a bad strategy at all.
